Re: Lightning


<steviephilips@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:1152398268.435638.5580@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
It's amazing
how many people get struck by lightning in the ear from using the phone.

Using the phone causes them to be struck by lightning in the ear ?

Or in the mouth!


Why ?

If an outside phone wire is hit by a lightning strike a tidal wave-like
power surge will travel down that line. If you're on the phone on the end of
that line - and you've got that phone close to your ear or mouth, which is
usual - then the large current can easily bridge the small gap - a spark
gap - from the metal earpiece or mouthpiece to you. (How many people have
surge protectors on their phone lines?)

In general the strike is unlikely to be lethal, but the ear canal and mouth
offer less resistant pathways to the nearby brain than does the skin. Just
occasionally an occurence is lethal. Those that do suffer this occurence
tend to end up with injuries to the ear drum (the noise can be anything up
to 150 dB or more) and burns around the ear, mouth and neck. (IIRC, the burn
marks tend to have a spread pattern. Lichtenberg something or other?)

Of course the other thing that can get fried when a strike hits the
telephone lines is your modem. (Do people put surge protectors on the phone
line into their modem?)

And since its an amazing occurance, how many is amazing ?

Okay, my use of 'amazing' wasn't intended to suggest a large number, but to
the highlight the fact that such an event can and does occur, contrary to
the expectations of many people who think that once inside their home
they're safe from lightning. People tend to forget that some things in their
home are connected to the outside and that a conductance path exists between
the outside and them!

In terms of numbers, these event are mercifully rare and small. In the US,
which gets more strikes than us here, about one fatality a year occurs to
someone using a phone (in their home) that gets a current surge from a
nearby strike on outside phone lines. IIRC, about 10-15 more people get
struck but survive. It does and has happened in the UK, but it's even rarer.

It's not an urban myth though!
http://www.snopes.com/horrors/techno/phone.asp



Of course we've recently had a report about the dangers of mobile phones and
lightning strikes. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/5106510.stm

IMO, this is a little OTT. The amount of metal in a mobile phone is
relatively small - there's far more plastic surrounding it! Is there enough
to increase the electric field around the phone sufficiently to send up a
leader? Probably not. A person standing outside in an open space in a
thunderstorm - them being the pointy 'tall' object - is probably just as
likely to send up a leader. The mobile phone probably has no more effect
than a wedding ring or a pocketful of coins. The report above cites three
other incidents around the world. Not many! There is a risk, but it's small.
There's more of a risk that someone hit by lightning might die because you
haven't got a mobile phone to call the emergency services!

As regards any EM radiation from a mobile being a source to attract
lightning, that's a UM.

Using a mobile indoors during a storm is safer than using a landline phone
because there's no physical connection to the outside where a strike may
occur.

There also used to be reports (again rare) of people getting struck through
surges flowing through (metal) pipework - struck by lightning in the shower,
etc. These days though most of the pipework from outside into a house is
non-conducting PVC.

There are on average 100 lightning strikes a second around the world.

The risk of being hit by lightning is estimated to be in excess of 3 000 000
to 1.

If you want to increase that risk then forget using a mobile or a landline
phone - that could take you years! Take a trip to somewhere equatorial such
as the eastern Congo (highest strike density in the world), find a nice open
space, go out in a storm and stick a ruddy big, very tall metal spike in the
ground and hold on to it tightly! Should give you an enlightening experience
in a much shorter time. Still no guarantee though!

Does this answer your question?

GAGS


.

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